BSkyB
Sky UK Limited (formerly British Sky Broadcasting or BSkyB) is a British telecommunications company which serves the United Kingdom. Sky provides television and broadband internet services and fixed line telephone services to consumers and businesses in the United Kingdom. It is the UK's largest pay-TV broadcaster with 11 million customers as of 2015.[1] It was the UK's most popular digital TV service until it was overtaken by Freeview in April 2007.[2] Its corporate headquarters are based in Isleworth.
Formed in November 1990 by the equal merger of Sky Television and British Satellite Broadcasting, BSkyB became the UK's largest digital subscription television company. Following BSkyB's acquisition of Sky Italia and a majority 90.04% interest in Sky Deutschland in November 2014, its holding company British Sky Broadcasting Group plc changed its name to Sky plc.[3] The United Kingdom operations also changed the company name from British Sky Broadcasting Limited to Sky UK Limited, still trading as "Sky".
Sky UK Limited is a wholly owned subsidiary of Sky plc.
The present service can trace its heritage back to 1990, when BSkyB's predecessors Sky Television and British Satellite Broadcasting encrypted their respective film channels – Sky Movies and The Movie Channel which required viewers to get decoding equipment and a subscription to watch the channels. After the two companies merged, subscribers could get access to both channels, and later the sports channel Sky Sports also became encrypted.
